vanessa21

Hello All:

My husband and I leave for Portugal from San Diego this Friday, and we are spending 9/8-9/11 (three nights) at the Douro Casa do Visconde de Chanceleiros in Pinhão . We are traveling by train from Porto, so will likely arrive mid afternoon.

We did not plan a car rental, but now I'm wondering if this was a mistake and would appreciate any advice on our plans.

Specifically, our thought was to spend Friday around the Casa and Pinhão , then find a driver for Saturday wine touring (part of the day). We are more interested in the area table wines rather than port, but would like to experience both. On Sunday, we hoped to take a boat/ river cruise between Pinhão and Tua, as we saw a recommendation that this segment is beautiful - e.g, a partial day or 2-4 hours tour. We contacted Casa do Visconde for recommendations, but they were unable to help due to the harvest and how busy everyone is.

Does anyone have a recommendation regarding a driver who can help us tour the area Saturday, visit some vineyards, have lunch somewhere, etc.? Given our interests, are there specific wineries and vineyards we should plan?

Any recommendations regarding specific boat tours that would be enjoyable? I see a lot of mixed reviews, and given how long we've left this, I would be grateful for any personal reviews.

On Friday, can we walk to any vineyards or other sites from our hotel? (We are both very fit).

Last, I'm wondering if we should reconsider the car rental and try to pick up a car in Peso da Regua Friday, and return it Monday. However, we have already booked our train from Pinhão back to Lisbon on Monday, so it could be a little tricky (and I'm uncertain if cars are available). I thought about renting just for Saturday, but it seems that the Europcar office closes at 12:30 and is not open Sunday.

Many thanks for any recommendations. We are traveling to celebrate my 50th and are both very excited for our first visit to Portugal!

Vanessa

mnag

A group of us (12) stayed at Quinta do pego in Pinhao last year. They set us up with a driver. Unfortunately I do not have his contact info but you may want to see if the hotel can provide you with the details. He came with the perfect size van to fit us all and I remember it worked out to be very reasonable for our group as compared to other options I had looked into. Also if you able to get in touch with the driver you should definitely have a list of winery's to visit and check in advance whether a reservation is required.
We toured Quinta da Pacheca (good tour), Quinta do Seixo (fab tasting room and grounds) and quinta do panascal (not my fav).

Robert2016

Casa do Visconde de Chanceleiros should be able to set you up with a driver for a day of wine tasting, but you will need reservations if you want to visit any of the wineries. Most do not allow for walk-ins.

The Europcar office in Peso da Regua is closed on Sunday, but you can pick the car up on Saturday and drop it off Monday morning at 9h00, when the office opens. Their least expensive rental is $137, prepay.

If you want to make your own arrangements, then you can contact the following:
Taxi Pinhão (http://taxipinhao.com) +351 966 192 904
Douro Táxi (http://dourotaxi.com.pt) +351 915 012 777

vanessa21

Thanks very much to both of you. Robert, we did ask Casa do Visconde about a driver, but they were unable to help with this. We will explore the rental/drop off option as well, we would just need to change our train trip from Pinhao to Lisbon to depart from Peso da Regua, but I assume this would be possible.

Vanessa

lobo_mau

BTW, the river is called Douro in Portuguese, Duero in Spanish and Duoro in Fodorian.